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SaskTel adds cellular network capacity to 10 rural communities

SaskTel adds cellular network capacity to 10 rural communities

June 19, 2015

SaskTel today announced it will be adding additional capacity to its wireless network in the following 10 communities in rural Saskatchewan to address the ever-growing customer demand: Candle Lake, Carlyle, Cochin, Greenwater Lake, Kerrobert, Kindersley, Lloydminster, Manitou Beach, Nipawin, and Turtle Lake.  SaskTel will be adding a network carrier in these 10 communities which will enhance the current tower capacity by 20% to 100%.

“SaskTel understands the importance of providing communications services in rural areas and it will continue to enhance the wireless network to improve the customer experience,” said Jim Reiter, Minister Responsible for SaskTel. “SaskTel has made significant investments in providing cellular service in this province and is the only wireless provider that has and will continue to invest in rural Saskatchewan.”

“SaskTel is pleased to provide enhanced capacity at these communities to address ongoing demand for bandwidth,” said Ron Styles, SaskTel President and CEO.  “Besides these 10 recent enhancements, SaskTel also completed over 464 4G capacity improvements in 2014 and 2015.”

Candle Lake, Cochin, and Greenwater Lake have a completion date of end of June 2015 in time for the July 1st long weekend.  Turtle Lake, Lloydminster and Manitou Beach have a tentative completion date of the end of July 2015.  Carlyle, Nipawin, Kerrobert, and Kindersley have a tentative completion date of the end of September 2015.  SaskTel’s expansion plans for Turtle Lake have been temporarily delayed due to an unexpected situation. This week it was discovered that a mating pair of bald eagles have nested on the Turtle Lake wireless tower.

“We have decided that it is in the best interest for the safety of our employees and the safety of the baby eagles to delay the tower upgrade until Turtle Lake’s most recent tourists have left the nest,” added Styles.

SaskTel uses a variety of infrastructure options to enhance wireless service based on usage patterns and demands. The addition of sectors and carriers increase network capacity by adding more radio frequency channels.  Each additional carrier added to a site will increase the network capacity at that site by an incremental amount.  Adding a second carrier approximately doubles network capacity. Going from two to three additional carriers increases network capacity by approximately 50 per cent above that and going from three to four additional carriers increases capacity by a further 33 per cent. Increasing sectors adds an antenna which further improves coverage and capacity.

About SaskTel

SaskTel is the leading Information and Communications Technology (ICT) provider in Saskatchewan, with over $1.2 billion in annual revenue and over 1.4 million customer connections including over 618,000 wireless accesses, 437,000 wireline network accesses, 258,000 Internet accesses and over 103,000 maxTV™ subscribers. SaskTel and its wholly-owned subsidiaries offer a wide range of ICT products and services including competitive voice, data and Internet services, wireless data services, maxTV services, data centre services, cloud-based services, security monitoring services, advertising services, and international software and consulting services. SaskTel and its wholly-owned subsidiaries have a workforce of approximately 4,000 full-time equivalent employees (FTEs). Visit SaskTel at www.sasktel.com.

 

For media inquiries only, please contact:

Tara Tibeau, SaskTel Manager of External Communications

306-777-4548

tara.tibeau@sasktel.com